incogkneeto.com blog

Happy birthday indeed! On June 8th 2008, 21 years after I was born, the Minneapolis Textile Center will be hosting the second day of its Shibori Symposium, and I found out soon enough to register for it!

I am most in awe of the work by Monoleena Banerjee:

Her seminar takes place from 9-11am on my birthday. How cool is that?

I am also eyeballing the following two seminars, respectively 11:15-12:15 and 1:30-3:30:

Thinking Outside the Box by Tricia Spitzmueller
Even creativity gets boxed in. Now that you have increased exposure to the fine art of shibori, what will you do with it? Join others in a lecture/discussion on how to expand and implement your creative energy. We will take shibori to the next level as we open up channels of creativity and engage our inner artist.

It sounds a little cheesy but it’s the kind of thing that depends on how much you put into it. (that doesn’t sound cheesy too does it?) I have also wondered about that very thing… wow, shibori. Now what?

and:

A Twist of Fabric by Candy Kuehn (current resident artist)
Drape squares, circles, rectangles or just plain yardage into jackets, dresses, pants, shirts and skirts using just a twist of fabric to make new shapes. This seminar shows you how to make many shapes for clothing and art with very little cutting or sewing - a great way to transform your shibori yardage without scissors! You’ll leave with simple, nuanced garment patterns you can further invent upon.

I am going to try to register tomorrow, I hope I make it :) Deadline is May 1!

For my birthday I am going to treat myself to some birch syrup and do such things as:

• make bison jerky with it
• make cheesecake and scones other oven goodies with it
• make ice cream with it
• sweeten cold-press coffee with it
• can you say baked birch butternut squash?

I have also read about creating apple syrup by boiling down apple juice and that sounds intriguing. It would be grand to harvest fresh fall apples, juice them at home, and immediately make apple syrup.

You know, these little discoveries can mean totally sourcing my own income someday… investing in real estate would not be so bad if I could have a yard of apple trees that I can harvest for the cost of their maintenance :)
a loft downtown, though, which is my inherited real estate investment… not really my idea of home, despite downtown being my ‘hood. (That is about contrast)

I also want to have mulberry trees for my silkworms to dine on, and harvest their silk peacefully and spin it into yarn to make wedding dresses with. I originally wanted to spin and crochet my own silk wedding dress but didn’t know how to do either yet so it wasn’t worth the investment/learning stress. It would be interesting to do one of these each year, over the years I would maybe garnish enough reputation to be able to coordinate specific commission…
just an idea :)
This reminds me that I had a dream about drop-spindle spinning.

Today proposes a warm, persistently rainy day. It is the first day of my weekend after a seven-day workweek. We woke up late because I can’t distinguish between AM and PM when setting alarm clocks :)

Daniel went to work. I am going to tidy the foot-high floor of our closet which is clothing and anything biodegradeable sitting around, then take a bus to downtown Minneapolis to find umbrellas and harvest ideas at the library. He will punctuate my day with lunch. Maybe I’ll join him at work after that.

I happen to adore rain. It is cleansing, and I like how it slows everybody’s pace. The world moves like a race and I’m not that competitive. Rain is a referee.

Yesterday after work I got on the bus to our evening destination and it was so empty for that bus, so I was not shy about claiming the entire seat with my luggage. Then I got absorbed in the Citypage’s best of the twin cities issue and suddenly the bus was busy and there was a man sitting on my things. He mumbled, oh sorry. I wouldn’t bother with this story if it wasn’t the third or fourth time it’s happened to me! Weird. It’s hard to say, hi, can I sit here? isn’t it?

Yes, and far easier to just sit on my watermelon! Of which he earned none.

There is lots to crochet. The connecting row of a skirt, a cardigan, and a hoodie which I have been reworking and reworking since before the mid-March San Francisco trip. But it’s a sweet design so no hard feelings, just carpal tunnel.

Also, I bought some dandelion greens and lemongrass at Whole Foods the other day, and need to figure out what to do with them. I think the best/only use for a digital library would be cookbooks on a PDA, because you’re at the grocery store and you know you’ve seen an amazing recipe for this seasonal ingredient but you don’t remember it or any of the other ingredients, thus a second grocery trip there will be. Unless of course, you had all your cookbooks in your pocket…

I do love things where various nerdy afflictions intersect: in this case, fibre art and digital storage.

Handfelted USB stick by quackhandmade